


at the end of every road it's always just you and me

by keplcrs



Series: kuroken week 2020 [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: 5+1, Canon Compliant, M/M, also maybe minor spoilers for the nationals arc but i tried to keep that vague, brief mentions of other nekoma members, spoilers for the land vs sky ova!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:21:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23664553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keplcrs/pseuds/keplcrs
Summary: "You shouldn’t disappear like that either, you’re going to get lost— what happens if I can’t find you?”He doesn’t bother with a response, because he knows Kuroo isn’t asking to get an answer, and anyway, he’s got enough faith in his best friend to know that Kuroo will probably always find him eventually.(or, Five Times Kenma is Found and One Time He Does the Finding)
Relationships: Kozume Kenma/Kuroo Tetsurou
Series: kuroken week 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1701487
Comments: 5
Kudos: 97





	at the end of every road it's always just you and me

**Author's Note:**

> kuroken week day 3: five times, one time
> 
> title is from daylight by matt and kim! this got. longer than i expected i think its my longest krkn week fic.

1:

 _Nekoma Junior High_ , Kenma thinks, feet swinging lightly as he waits for the classroom to empty after the final bell, _is not as grand as Kuro’s stories made it out to be_. 

His console is dead, battery worn down from a lunch hour spent hunched over his desk while his classmates circled the room introducing themselves to each other and leaving him alone except for the occasional apology whenever someone bumped into his desk, and he blames his nerves for the fact that he’d forgotten to charge it the previous night. 

In all fairness, Kuroo’s stories tend to get a bit out of hand— especially when he’s trying to pull a reaction from Kenma— and Kenma has always known that Kuroo was making it all sound much more grandiose than it actually would be, because there’s no way that junior high could be _that_ great, but apparently Kuroo was more convincing than he’d initially believed, because the reality is far more disappointing than he had been prepared for. 

The worst part of it all, really, is the fact that he hasn't actually seen Kuroo since that morning, when he'd broken away from a group of what Kenma had assumed were his teammates and jogged over to say hello before the bell rang. There had been no sign of him at lunch, even in passing, and although Kenma isn't so self-absorbed as to think that Kuroo would spend his lunch break hanging out in some first-year classroom just because Kenma can't make friends, it still sucks. He knows he’ll see Kuroo when he gets home— that is, if they’re sticking to their routine of Kuroo barging in as soon as he gets home from school to either settle into his spot next to Kenma’s bed with one of his controllers or drag Kenma out to one of their backyards with a volleyball in hand. That had been last year’s routine, when they got home at different times from different schools. He hadn’t been sure if it would change this year, now that Kenma is finally in junior high with him.

It looks like it won’t.

He’s still sitting in his seat, and the clock on the wall says the bell rang six minutes ago. Most of his classmates bolted out the door as soon as the bell had chimed, but Kenma had taken one look at the rush of students outside the classroom door and decided that avoiding the crowd was worth getting home ten minutes late, sinking into his seat to wait.

He counts the minutes in his head as they pass. 

When he reaches eight, the classroom is empty save for him and two other students who sit at the back of the room, packing up slowly and getting distracted every other second. Kenma has been trying to tune them out. 

At nine minutes, he grabs his backpack and makes sure everything is inside, as if he hasn’t checked it several times already. He’s dragging his feet, and he knows he needs to get home soon before his mom starts to fret, but he’s feeling slow and kind of disappointed and maybe just a little bit guilty for being disappointed. At least the hallway is empty, he muses. Mostly empty. He ducks his head anyways, letting his hair drape over his face in a curtain. 

He blames his narrowed field of vision when he bumps into someone as soon as he steps foot out of the classroom. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled, just as the other person takes him by the shoulders, and— oh. “Kuro.”

“Hi,” he says, and he’s smiling, Kenma’s relieved enough to see him that he doesn’t feel particularly bad anymore. “I was looking for you!”

“Oh.” Kenma shifts his weight from foot to foot and tries to think of a more eloquent response. “You’ve found me now,” he settles for. Kuroo laughs.

“Sorry I couldn’t come say hi earlier, I wasn’t sure where your class was and I didn’t want to, you know, barge into a bunch of first year classes at lunch trying to find you, but, hey! We can walk home together again! I mean, if you want to. And I know where your classroom is, now, so I can drop by more often. Maybe.”

There’s a touch of nerves in his voice, and it’s strangely reassuring to know that Kuroo’s missed him just as much as he’s missed Kuroo. 

2:

Practice is gruelling and the third years are relentless in the way that they lord themselves over the first years.

(There are three first years. This makes for a horribly imbalanced fight against the five third years on the team, even without considering the hierarchy that prevents the three of them from doing anything.)

Kenma is tired, all sweat and aches and too-warm temperatures but he’d still been lagging behind for most of the practice, and it doesn’t escape the notice of their third year captain, who turns on him as soon as they’re back in the gym. Kenma doesn’t pay attention to what he says— he’d stopped listening a week after making it onto the team— but he doesn’t need to pay attention to get the gist of what’s being said to him.

Normally, he can handle it just fine, even if ‘handling it’ mostly involves ducking his head and trying to lay low more than he usually does. It makes practice a little bit more miserable, but Kuroo had asked him to join the club with bright eyes and a wide grin and stories of what he thinks they can achieve together, and Kenma hadn’t been able to say no— hadn’t been given any real reason to, because when he weighs his distaste for getting tired against his desire to see Kuroo smile like that, there’s a clear winner.

He thinks he might be able to say no now, though. 

It’s been a long day and a longer practice, and he’s been singled out one too many times, and he thinks he might have a fever but he’ll only be singled out _more_ if he asks to leave early or bails during cleanup, so he pushes through it and only trips over the mop twice. 

Kuroo isn’t in the locker room anymore when the first years finally pile in, and Kenma tries to quash the bitter feeling in his chest. He doesn’t have the energy to go looking for his best friend, though— his head hurts, and he feels shaky on his feet— so he settles down just outside the school gates, sitting against the stone pillar with his knees pulled to his chest, staring blankly at his console screen because looking at a bright screen only makes his eyes burn. 

He figures he can wait ten minutes. Just ten minutes, and if Kuroo doesn’t show, then Kenma can muster up the energy to call him.

He doesn’t need to wait ten minutes.

Kuroo finds him after two minutes, rounding the corner and nearly tripping over him, and Kenma maybe feels a little guilty when he sees the look on his face. There’s worry written all over his expression, and Kenma doesn’t think he’ll do a very good job of convincing Kuroo that he’s fine.

Thankfully, he doesn’t have to. 

The console is eased out of his hands and tucked into Kuroo’s bag, and Kenma feels a hand on his forehead, pushing his bangs aside. “You have a fever,” Kuroo tells him, and Kenma hums an acknowledgement, leaning into the touch. Kuroo’s hand is cool against his skin. “Kenma.”

“Mmh?”

“Let’s go home.” Kenma is pliant as Kuroo hauls him to his feet. He fidgets with the hem of his blazer as they start walking, fingers running over the edge of the fabric in an attempt to keep himself present. Kuroo is still talking. “You should stay home tomorrow. I’ll let Coach know, and I can grab your notes from, uh— Yamamoto is in your class, right?”

His voice is soothing, sort of. He’s toned it down, speaking quieter and softer than he normally does, accommodating Kenma's headache. It gives him something to focus on that _doesn’t_ make his head hurt worse. 

Kenma registers the question a few seconds too late. He makes a face and nods, and despite himself, he’s pleased at the chuckle that it pulls from his best friend.

Kuroo keeps talking. “Is it just the fever? Yeah? It’s probably a practice thing, then— you know, you really don’t have to push yourself so much, I don’t want you getting hurt. You shouldn’t disappear like that either, you’re going to get lost— what happens if I can’t find you?” 

He doesn’t bother with a response, because he knows Kuroo isn’t asking to get an answer, and anyway, he’s got enough faith in his best friend to know that Kuroo will probably always find him eventually.

(Later, when Kenma admits to thinking about quitting and Kuroo asks him to stick it out a little longer, he decides it’s worth it and agrees to stay.)

3:

Generally, Kenma doesn’t panic when he gets lost or left behind. 

He doesn’t need to. It’s a little bit bothersome, sure, and he knows Kuroo will scold him for it later, but it’s happened often enough over the years that he also knows Kuroo will track him down eventually, so long as he stays put. 

So he does.

They’re in Miyagi for a series of practice matches, and he knows he should be paying more attention that usual because this isn’t Tokyo, and neither he nor Kuroo are familiar with the streets here, but the team is loud and Kenma doesn’t particularly like travelling, so he pulls up a game on his phone while they walk, trying to clear his head.

When he looks up, he’s alone. 

His phone isn’t currently being bombarded with messages, so he assumes that Kuroo isn’t panicking yet either. Still, he sends him a text with a vague description of his surroundings, tacking a mostly-sincere apology to the end as he settles down to wait, hunched over his phone so that he can see the screen properly.

It’s only been a few minutes before he hears footsteps, and he nearly dies in-game because Kuroo’s always found him but never this quickly, and Kenma had been expecting to wait at least fifteen minutes for his friend to navigate the unfamiliar streets— he doesn’t know when he had gotten lost, but he’s sure it was long enough ago that finding him wasn’t just a matter of retracing their steps.

He glances up and immediately regrets it.

It’s not Kuroo. 

In hindsight, the footsteps should have been a dead giveaway— they were quicker and lighter than Kuroo’s, and there was no way Kuroo would have gotten so close without calling out to him first. (He’s just so used to it being Kuroo that approaches him.)

Instead of Kuroo, it’s a stranger who seems much too eager as he runs up to Kenma. The boy looks around his age, maybe younger, and he’s boundless energy and a bright voice that makes Kenma instinctively shy away. He looks as bright as he sounds, and he talks quickly enough that Kenma is struggling to keep up, mumbling his answers and glancing at his phone as if he can somehow get Kuroo to hurry up and find him through sheer willpower alone.

He admits that he’s lost, trying not to flinch away as the stranger crouches next to him. 

There’s a moment of silence, and Kenma thinks that maybe this is bearable, if all that this kid is going to do is sit there and watch him play. 

“Is that fun?” He asks. Kenma stands corrected.

It isn’t— he just wants to kill time until Kuroo arrives— so he says as much and wonders if maybe he can get more quiet time if he stops responding. His earbuds are in his bag, maybe he could grab them.

Before he can, the boy jumps to his feet. 

Kenma doesn’t try to hide his flinch this time.

“Are you a volleyball player?” He asks, and Kenma glances down at his bag. “Those are volleyball shoes!”

Kenma nods, and the boy officially introduces himself as Hinata Shouyou. His shirt says Karasuno High School, and it takes Kenma a moment to realize why it sounds familiar— they’re one of the teams that Nekoma is going up against this week.

Shouyou is loud and brash, but he seems to be at least somewhat aware of Kenma’s boundaries— the sudden approach from before being an exception— and he carries the conversation well enough that Kenma doesn’t have to stress himself out about responding, so he doesn’t really mind the conversation. 

He learns that Shouyou is a middle blocker, and that his setter is intense— which, Kenma’s been told he’s intense too, when he gets really into a game, but it sounds like Shouyou’s setter is intense _all the time_ and Kenma isn’t really looking forward to seeing what ‘intense’ means to someone like Shouyou.

He does get a little more invested in the conversation than he’d expected, to the point where he doesn’t hear Kuroo’s approach at all— doesn’t even register that he’s there until he’s a meter away and calling Kenma’s name. 

“Oh. Kuro,” he says, and as nice as it was to talk to Shouyou, he can’t shake the relief that comes with seeing his best friend. He can only handle so much impromptu social interaction. “See you soon, Shouyou.”

(As expected, Kuroo gives him the usual lecture while they walk back to the rest of the team, with some added bits about being in a new place. Kenma hums as if he’s listening and ignores Kuroo’s questions about Shouyou, mumbling a thanks when Kuroo keeps a hand on his back to guide him even when they’ve regrouped with the team.)

4:

Kenma doesn’t hate training camp. 

He’s never really enjoyed them, but this one in particular decidedly doesn’t suck. They win a reasonable amount of games, which saves him from having to do the penalties. Shouyou is here, and when Kenma is playing a game during their breaks, he’ll plop down beside him to watch— he only tends to stay for fifteen minutes at a time before flitting off to talk to someone else, but those fifteen minutes with a relatively quiet Shouyou are always nice. Akaashi is here too, a familiar enough face thanks to Kuroo and Bokuto’s friendship— granted, he’s usually busy, but he’ll seek Kenma out for a moment of quiet sometimes, and Kenma can respect that. When it isn’t one of them, and when he’s got a free moment— usually while he waits to shower— Kuroo will slide into the seat next to him or crowd onto Kenma’s futon to look over his shoulder, making comments or simply watching him play.

He dislikes the amount of practice that he has to do, and how his arms usually ache at the end of the week, but all in all, he doesn’t hate it.

He does like the atmosphere in the hallway, an hour after the lights were turned off and everyone else went to bed.

Kenma has always had this habit of staying up too late. Sleeping in a room full of his teammates hadn’t helped him deal with it— instead, he’d taken to slipping out of the room altogether, finding a secluded spot a few hallways away to play until he got tired enough to sleep. It usually worked. He’d fallen asleep before making it back to Nekoma’s room a few times, but he was usually found and brought back well before breakfast. The first time, it had been one of the Shinzen second years, which had caused a minor panic. Once, Fukurodani’s manager had found him. Sometimes it was Kuroo. 

Usually, it was Kuroo.

It’s Kuroo tonight, too. It’s still late, and Kenma hasn’t fallen asleep during his late-night escapades at this camp yet, but he hears the shuffle of footsteps approaching and sees Kuroo’s shadow just as the other turns the corner. He’s by the vending machine today, back pressed to the glass as he sits with his knees pulled up to his chest, playing on his phone because he forgot to charge his console earlier that day.

“Kenma?”

“Here,” he says, eyes focusing on his screen instead of Kuroo’s approaching form. “M’not tired,” he adds, because he really isn’t, and if Kuroo is here to try and get him to go to bed, Kenma knows he isn’t going to be able to sleep. It isn’t that late yet, and no one has ever followed him out of the room— it’s only if he doesn’t come back before breakfast that they go looking for him.

“I know,” Kuroo says, bumping his foot against Kenma’s. “Scoot over, lemme sit.” Kenma squints up at him, but Kuroo’s face gives nothing away, so he moves over and lets the other boy join him. “What are you playing?”

“Stardew Valley.” Kenma tilts his screen to show him, and the movement brings them closer, his shoulder pressed to Kuroo’s arm. Neither of them make any move to pull away, so he takes it as an invitation to rest more of his weight against the older boy. 

Kuroo hums in response, gently nudging him until they’re both comfortable, Kuroo’s arm draped loosely around Kenma so that he can curl up against his side, the screen visible to both of them. He’s warm, a welcome source 

“You named your cat after Shrimpy?” He asks, once, when Kenma is reorganizing his inventory. It’s his only interruption, and Kenma nods in response. 

“It kind of looks like him,” he explains. “Plus, he was with me when I started this save file.”

Kuroo nods, and Kenma moves on. 

Kenma has gone through half of an in-game season when he feels the weight of Kuroo’s head on top of his own, the rhythm of his breathing shifting to something slower and more even. “Kuro?” He whispers, hitting pause. There’s no response. “Kuro.” 

He finishes the day, waiting for the game to auto-save before he turns off his phone.

“Kuro,” he says again, a little louder, trying to squirm out of Kuroo’s grip. This time, he gets a response— a grunt of protest and an arm curling tighter around his torso. “You’re heavy,” he protests, shoving lightly at Kuroo’s chest. That seems to do the trick.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, sitting up and letting go of Kenma. He tries not to miss the warmth too much as they stand up. “Didn’t mean to fall asleep on you. Are we heading back now?”

Kenma nods and tries to remember the way back to Nekoma’s room. Next to him, Kuroo rubs his eyes and blinks at him, looking tired. “Mhm.” He glances down at his phone, running his thumb over the volume buttons. “Why’d you come get me?”

Kuroo puts a hand on his back and stops him from turning the wrong way. “Missed you,” he replies, as if that makes things any clearer for Kenma. As if sensing his confusion, Kuroo explains further, and Kenma can hear the tiredness edging into his voice. “I got roped into extra practice and barely saw you after dinner. Also, Yamamoto and Lev were arguing and I needed some peace.”

It’s nice, to hear that he can still provide respite for Kuroo after all of these years watching his best friend grow into himself and get more comfortable in a crowd— god only knows how much time Kenma has spent seeking out Kuroo for a moment of calm and comfort.

He doesn’t say anything in response, but he does press himself closer to Kuroo’s side and hope that it conveys what he feels.

5:

There is a hallway with all of their bags lined up along the wall, near-identical save for stickers and pins and keychains to identify whose bag it is. Most of them are half open. Kenma can see Fukunaga’s headphones looped around the strap of his bag, and Inuoka’s jacket is thrown haphazardly over what is presumably his own bag and someone else’s— Lev’s, maybe.

It’s a quiet hallway, with the rest of the team outside to eat lunch and pass a ball back and forth to keep themselves warm in between matches. It’s secluded enough that hardly any passes by, and whoever _does_ generally keeps to themself.

It’s the perfect place, really, for Kenma to tuck himself into a corner, half-finished lunch on the ground next to him and earbuds in, flicking through games on his phone. 

There’s a ‘ _Good luck!!!!!!’_ message from Shouyou in his notifications, and a Snapchat from Bokuto from before their match that he has yet to open, and a ‘ _you feeling okay?’_ from Kuroo. 

He isn’t really sure how he feels. 

On one hand, losing to Fukurodani was the most likely outcome. They’ve played each other countless times, taking practice matches deep into third sets until Fukurodani eventually pulls ahead and wins. Kenma was fully prepared for that. He’s even more prepared for the match against Nohebi, because he’d expected it— and this match is one he’s fairly sure they can win.

Still. It might be their last game. 

It’s not the pressure of the idea that gets to him— Kenma knows his abilities, knows what he’s capable of. He has his place on the team and he’ll play as he normally does, and whether that’s enough or not is yet to be decided. That much, he can’t really change. 

For all of his indifference towards the game, though… he doesn’t want to lose this match, and he doesn’t want this team to end here. It’s not going to be his last high school game if they lose— he’s already decided he’ll keep playing— but it’s going to be Kuroo’s, and Yaku’s, and Kai’s, and that’s what’s giving him pause. There’s a fifty percent chance that this will be their last match, and Kenma doesn’t particularly want to lose this team yet, because they’re family in a way that Kenma isn’t used to after years of following Kuroo from team to team. This is the first team where he’s shaken off the label of ‘Kuroo’s setter friend’ without having to shake off Kuroo altogether, and he wants to hold onto it a little longer.

(There’s also the promise of the Battle of the Garbage Dump, which, while Kenma isn’t particularly invested in the whole ‘Cats vs. Crows’ rivalry thing, he knows Shouyou is, and he knows Kuroo is, and he _does_ want to play Karasuno again.)

He’s so caught up in his own thoughts that he doesn’t realize Kuroo is approaching until he’s crouched in front of Kenma, his shadow blocking out the light reflecting off of his phone. 

Patient as ever when it comes to Kenma, Kuroo waits until he finishes a round of Minesweeper and pulls out his earbuds before speaking up.

“You didn’t finish your lunch,” is what Kuroo says. _‘Are you okay,’_ is what he means. 

Kenma puts his phone down. “Wasn’t hungry,” he replies, and then because he knows Kuroo will fuss about it, adds on, “I’ve had some of it. I’ll be okay for the match, and I’ll remember to eat afterwards.

It’s not a lie. Kuroo stares at him for a moment longer, and seems to accept the answer, because he moves to sit in the empty space next to Kenma, stretching his legs out. 

“Are you okay?” 

It’s Kenma who ends up asking directly, because Kuroo is being quiet and it isn’t unnerving but it’s the specific kind of quiet that means he’s overthinking something and keeping it bottled up for Kenma’s benefit. It’s as much a genuine question as it is a reminder that he doesn’t need to keep up any sort of ‘encouraging captain’ facade when it’s just the two of them.

Kuroo seems to see the question for what it is, giving Kenma a sidelong glance as he nods. “Yeah.” A pause. “Are you?”

“Mhm.” He nods, and debates saying more. He knows he doesn’t need to, technically. Kuroo doesn’t expect any pep talks or inspirational speeches from him. “We’ll be fine,” is what he settles for. “We’re more evenly matched with Nohebi, and we’ve beat them before.”

(It’s all stuff that Kuroo probably already knows, but the alternative is talking about how this might be their last game, and Kenma doesn’t want to discuss that now— he’ll get stuck on his words and it’ll bother him for the entire match, and Kuroo will get sappy and sentimental, and all of that needs to wait until _after_ their final match together, which, Kenma reminds himself, might not even be this match.)

Kuroo smiles at him, shoulder bumping against Kenma’s as he pushes away from the wall and stands up, offering him a hand. “Yeah,” he agrees, and he looks a little less tense. “Of course we’ll be fine.”

+1:

Their real final match is on the National stage, and the anxiety from before the Nohebi match plays no part in it. 

If anything, Kenma is a little relieved. 

He had fun, sure— genuine fun, not the usual kind of ‘fun when he thinks about it and not quite as fun when he’s in the moment’— but Nationals is exhausting, and he’s tired, and they got their Battle at the Garbage Dump so there really isn’t much left for him to look forward to except a long, much-needed nap.

(Something about making it so far with this team has him playing harder than he ever has— diving for balls and setting when he normally would have been satisfied with a dig— and it’s worth it for the pride in Kuroo’s eyes and the smile on Kai’s face and the pat on the back that he gets from Tora as he hands Kenma a water bottle. It makes the extra effort worthwhile, but Kenma still bemoans the fact that he _knows_ he’ll get sick as soon as he gets home.)

When they return to their hotel at the end of the day, it’s with too much takeout and equal parts celebration and tears. Kenma is dragged into the festivities-slash-cry-fest despite his protests. There are less protests than usual, though, and Kai promises to let him slip away if he gets overwhelmed, so Kenma lets his teammates surround him with noise and laughter and stories that he’s heard a thousand times being told again for the first-years. It’s like training camp, almost, but now there’s an air of finality that hangs over their heads, prompting them to get even more nostalgic and sentimental. 

Halfway through the night, Kuroo slips out of the room. Kenma catches his eye as he leaves, starting to get up, but Kuroo shakes his head and nods towards the rest of the team, so Kenma sits back down.

It takes fifteen minutes for someone to ask about their missing captain— Kenma has pulled away from the circle and settled down with his phone in hand when Lev points it out. 

“He went out,” is all he offers in explanation. Still, Yaku looks worried, and curfew is soon anyway, so Kenma drags himself out of his futon and grabs his jacket. He spots Kuroo’s jacket too and frowns, picking it up to bring with him and promising to be back soon, hopefully with their captain in tow.

Kuroo isn’t hard to find. He hasn’t gone far.

It’s cold outside, the January air seeping in through Kenma’s layered sweaters and track jacket, but the sky is clear, so Kenma makes a beeline for the parking lot behind their hotel. Kuroo is there, sitting on the curb with his head tilted back to look at the sky.

He scuffs his shoes along the pavement to let Kuroo know he’s there as he approaches, sitting down on the cold pavement next to him and holding out the jacket.

“Don’t get sick,” he says, watching as Kuroo pulls the jacket around his shoulders like a blanket, sleeves hanging loose. “We can’t both be out of commission at the same time.”

“I’m not going to get sick,” Kuroo assures him, rolling his eyes and glancing at Kenma. “By the way, I fully expect you to be in bed and resting when we get home. Resting _properly_. Not just sitting in bed playing Metal Gear.” 

It’s Kenma’s turn to roll his eyes, leaning against Kuroo’s side. “Yeah, I know. I think I’ll probably pass out as soon as I get into bed. My bed, at home.” He pauses for a moment, listening to the hum of the city and Kuroo’s breaths next to him. “I had fun, today. Thank you.”

He feels more than hears Kuroo’s small huff of laughter, an arm moving to wrap around his shoulders. “Geez, you really must be getting sick if you’re thanking me for making you do sports,” he teases, and Kenma can hear the fondness hidden in his tone. “I’m glad you’re actually enjoying yourself, though. You’re gonna keep playing next year, right?”

Kenma nods. They’ve talked about it before, so it isn’t as if Kuroo doesn’t already know this. He’s almost surprised at how easy it is to agree to keep playing. He doesn’t really need to— his volleyball career started with Kuroo, so it isn’t outrageous to consider the idea that it ends when Kuroo graduates, but he’s sure he can stick it out for one more year. 

Besides, he’s not just doing it for Kuroo anymore.

They stay outside for another ten minutes, huddled close for warmth— more for Kenma’s benefit than Kuroo’s— and talking about anything and everything. Kuroo does most of the talking, drifting from topic to topic as he goes over his university options and talks about what he wants for next year’s team and what they should do now that they’ve got a break from practice, and Kenma jumps in with hums of acknowledgement and quiet comments until both of their phones buzz with a notification from the team group chat. 

“Oh, right,” Kenma mumbles, looking at the message on Kuroo’s screen, because his own hands are shoved as far into his pockets as they’ll go and he doesn’t want to pull them out to check his own phone. The text is from Kai, a reminder to keep an eye on the time. “I was supposed to tell you that it’s getting late. We should head back inside.”

Kuroo laughs. “Ah. I was wondering why you were out here.”

“It wasn’t just that,” he protests, and sort of regrets it when Kuroo raises an eyebrow, waiting for him to elaborate. Kenma considers getting up and leaving, but in the end, he gives in. “I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he admits, and looks up in time to catch the way Kuroo’s gaze softens. 

“I am,” Kuroo says, and he sounds sincere. “We played our best, and you had fun. What more could I ask for?”

Kenma draws one of his hands free to shove at Kuroo’s shoulder, mumbling “Sap,” as he reluctantly stands up, waiting for Kuroo to join him. “Come on, let’s go back inside before they send someone out to get us.”

They head back inside to a still-rowdy room, interrupting a pillow fight between the first-years and Tora. Things get quieter eventually, when the coaches interrupt them to tell them to keep it down and they settle down enough that the conversation no longer involves yelling. If Kenma sits a little closer to Kuroo than normal, no one questions it. 

It’s still chaotic, in the way that it always is, but it’s familiar, and he thinks that Kuroo was right, as sappy as it had been— he couldn’t ask for anything better than this.

**Author's Note:**

> as always, you can find me at [ejpraijin](https://ejpraijin.tumblr.com) on tumblr!!


End file.
